On June 4, 2021 a poll was sent to membership to choose the Board Officers and Directors for the year starting July 1, 2021.

Officers are re-elected each year. Directors serve terms of three years, and can be renewed by vote afterwards. A quorum of 31 members must vote by June 30. Results were received from 40 members by June 7 confirming or renewing all candidates by majority vote. More details can be found in the SCVAS Bylaws.

Officers re-elected
President: Barry Langdon-Lassagne
Vice President: Bill Walker
Secretary: Joan Leighton
Treasurer: Bob Hirt

Directors confirmed or renewed
Gabrielle Feldman (renewed)
Vivek Khanzodé (renewed)
Sue Pelmulder (confirmed)

President

Barry Langdon-Lassagne

Barry Langdon-Lassagne grew up in the foothills of Mount Diablo where he would frequently hike and camp. He started actively birding in the 1980s in college at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. He banded birds for SFBBO in the early 1990s and he's been participating in SCVAS's annual spring Birdathon since 2005.

In 2016, Barry retired from a software engineering career at Apple and now devotes more time to his love of nature and conservation. Since joining the SCVAS board in 2019, Barry has served as Board President, lead the effort to redesign our website, helped launch our YouTube channel, contributed articles to The Avocet, and guided birding field trips. He has served as chair of the Birdathon Committee and participated in multiple committees including Personnel, Finance, Outreach, Field Trip, Development and Education.

Barry still enjoys software development, managing to combine it with his birding passion by authoring a bird checklisting app for the iPhone. His other interests include bird and wildflower photography, astronomy, astrophotography, and baking bread.

Vice President

Bill Walker

Bill has been birding in California since 1996 and photographing wild birds and their environment since 2003. He teaches bird photography at Google, Point Reyes Birding Festival, and the Coastside Land Trust. His photos are published on Instagram and at birdwalker.com.

Since joining the SCVAS board in 2019, Bill has been active with the Field Trip committee and is helping create video content for SCVAS's YouTube channel. He credits the SCVAS 2012 trip to Costa Rica with opening a door to birding travel, which has been very rewarding. 

Bill has worked in software engineering at Apple, Cisco, Mozilla, and most recently, Google. Bill holds a PhD in Computer Science from University of Illinois, where he studied object-oriented software, jazz piano, and electronic music. Bill currently directs the choir at University Lutheran Church in Palo Alto.

Secretary

Joan Leighton

Joan has been on the SCVAS Board since 2004 and has acted as its Secretary for most of that time. She also serves on the Executive, Nominating, and Personnel committees. 

A professional librarian, Joan started her career at Harvard's East Asian Library, went on to manage the several libraries of a national accounting firm, and then came to Stanford where she oversaw many of the programs and services of Stanford's main and undergraduate libraries. Retirement was followed by three years with San Francisco's Koret Foundation directing a national book award program.

Joan’s time is now spent birding while travelling, hosting emerging string quartets, collecting fruit stickers (one of the largest such collections in the world), and playing with family and friends up and down the California coast.

Treasurer

Bob Hirt

Bob Hirt has been on the Board since 2003, serving both as  President and Treasurer. He is also active on the Nominating, Personnel, Birdathon, Finance, and Membership committees.

Bob has been involved in Bay Area Audubon activities since 1977 and has served on the Boards of Golden Gate Audubon (President), Farallon Island Foundation (Treasurer), and Friends of Richardson Bay (Controller) and Audubon Canyon Ranch. In his view, SCVAS is the leader in the South Bay in birding activities, wildlife education and environmental action. He sees SCVAS as assertive and collaborative in protecting bird and wildlife habitats.

Bob earned an MBA in Finance at Western Michigan University and a CPA certificate while at KPMG in San Francisco. His business career was in Corporate Finance specializing in Corporate Tax and Treasury with Bank of America, Lucky Stores, Measurex, Solectron and ending at SanDisk. After retiring from his international tax consulting practice, he is devoting his time to SCVAS, birding and his four grandchildren. 

Directors being Confirmed or Renewed

Gabrielle Feldman
Joined Board 2015, vote to renew

Gabrielle joined the Board of Directors in March 2015 and has served on the Outreach and Environmental Action Committees. Gabrielle has over 20 years of experience working with natural resource managers, NGOs, governments, and businesses on a variety of wildlife conservation projects throughout the Bay Area and beyond. She combines her passion for wildlife conservation and sustainable development with an expert knowledge of local, national and international law. By utilizing a holistic approach, she has led complicated planning and implementation processes designed to conserve natural resources while promoting sustainable development. In her free time, Gabrielle enjoys spending time with her husband and their twin children and cooking and baking for a crowd. If she isn’t hanging out with her family, she spends her time outdoors hiking and exploring nature.

Vivek Khanzodé
Joined Board 2011, vote to renew

Vivek’s interest in birds and nature blossomed after a trip to Costa Rica in 2009. The Resplendent Quetzal mesmerized him, and since then he has been traveling the US and the neotropics in Central and South America annually on nature themed vacations to capture the beauty of birds. Vivek has been a member of the SCVAS Board since 2011 and currently serves on the Executive, Membership & Development, and Nominating Committees. He brings to the Board the perspectives of both a committed birder and an engineering manager in the Semiconductor industry in the Silicon Valley. He is a strong supporter and active presenter in the Bay Area Bird Photographers group of SCVAS. In his spare time, Vivek photographs birds in the Bay Area and beyond. His bird photos have been published by the National Audubon Society, the American Bird Conservancy, and several other conservation related organizations. His bird and nature photographs can be enjoyed at www.birdpixel.com.

Sue Pelmulder
Joined Board partway through 2020, vote to confirm

Sue started backpacking in the Sierras at age 3 and has enjoyed the outdoors for a very long time. But she fell in love with birds when she moved to Mountain View and started taking walks at Charleston Slough. With the help of SCVAS, Sue is learning to identify smaller birds, but still appreciates any bird big enough to be seen. Sue joined the Board of Directors in July 2020 and helps out wherever needed. Sue trained as an engineer and conducted research in water resources planning and management, before following her passion for audio to be an engineer at a recording studio. Always looking to learn something new, she became an attorney and has helped clients with their insurance problems for the past 15 years. When class is in session, Sue can be found on Monday nights playing viola for local Scottish dance classes, and enjoys meeting up online with musicians from around the world.